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Occupational diseases on rise in Guangdong
www.chinaview.cn
BEIJING, April 14 -- Guangdong government will spend 40 million yuan (US$4.83 million) to find and fight increasing work-related disease cases in the province.
Some 150,000 Guangdong residents had pneumoconiosis, a lung disease caused by dust inhalation, a government health meeting was told Tuesday.
Authorities are investigating a precious stone processing enterprise in Foshan where dozens of workers were suspected of having the disease.
The meeting was told four welders in a Jiangmen container manufacturing enterprise also had developed pneumoconiosis, and the company had seven other suspected cases.
Pneumoconiosis is the most common occupational disease in Guangdong, with precious stone processing and container manufacturing workers often suffering from the condition.
Guangdong health authorities only received 800 reports of occupational diseases in the past three years, despite a rising number of occupational disease sufferers.
It was hard for doctors to tell whether a disease was related to one’s job, said Huang Hanlin, head of the Guangdong Provincial Occupational Disease Prevention and Treatment Hospital. Therefore, many occupational disease cases were not reported to authorities.
Some occupational disease sufferers could have diseases long before getting any symptoms. Benzene poisoning could cause blood cancer, but the latent period could be as long as 30 years, said Huang, explaining why many occupational disease cases were not reported.
Experts say there would be more work-related disease cases in Guangdong in the next five years, especially because some diseases caught more than a dozen years ago, when Guangdong started full industrialization, have not had time to show symptoms yet.
Precious stone processors and container welders are vulnerable to pneumoconiosis in Guangdong while leather processors can catch blood cancer and aplastic anemia.
Hardware welders could be poisoned by Trichloroethylene, and battery producers are exposed to lead and cadmium.
(Source: Shenzhen Daily)
Renewed Hope for Patients In Need of Life-Saving Rare Blood; NY Blood Center 'Precise Match Blood Donor Program' Receives Generous Gift from J.P. Morgan Chase Foundation
NEW YORK, June 6 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Last month, Davina Daniels, single mother from Springfield Gardens, Queens, was critically ill due to her continued struggle against sickle cell disease, a debilitating blood disorder affecting one in 500 African Americans. She was also suffering, and continues to suffer, from aplastic anemia rendering her body unable to produce red blood cells. Because of the numerous blood transfusions Davina has received over the years battling her condition, Ms. Daniels has developed antibodies to many blood antigens and can only receive blood from those of the same racial background. The problem was that when it was most needed, there were only two such units available in the NY/NJ area.
While this time New York Blood Center (NYBC) and Davina's doctors were able to find enough blood product to save her life, there is no guarantee it will be there the next time it is needed, just as there is no guarantee for countless others in the same predicament.
However, today there is renewed hope for patients with this and various other conditions of the same seriousness that touch nearly every ethnic community in NY/NJ. Frederick W. Hill, executive vice president, marketing and communications, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., visited New York Blood Center today to deliver much-needed support to the "Precise Match Blood Donor Program." The Precise Match Program is a world leader in the discovery and identification of rare blood antigens and has gone way beyond typical A, B and O blood typing to ensure that NY/NJ's diverse patient community has access to a more diverse supply of blood products.
Of the program, Hill commented: "Time and again, patients stricken with sickle cell disease, aplastic anemia and various forms of leukemia have received critical, life-saving transfusions because of the benefits derived from precise matching. JPMorgan is proud to support New York Blood Center's vital ability to extend these medical treatments to our community."
New York Blood Center president and CEO Dr. Robert Jones remarked, "We are incredibly grateful for the backing of The J.P. Morgan Chase Foundation. Their support and recognition of the health needs of our uniquely diverse community is appreciated by all of us here at New York Blood Center, and by the whole NY/NJ patient community." He added, "One thing everybody can do to help is to give blood whenever they are able, and when doing so, check off the ethnic background field as this is what enables us to identify and engage possible rare-blood donors."
Pascal George, vice president, head of New York Blood Center's "Precise Match Blood Donor Program" added, "Only through the generous support of organizations such as The J.P. Morgan Chase Foundation can NYBC continue to study this field, expand awareness of the importance of a diverse blood supply and recruit a greater number of donor's to meet the community's need for rare blood. For that we are grateful."
New York Blood Center (NYBC), one of the nation's largest community blood organizations has been providing blood, transfusion products and services to patients in New York and New Jersey hospitals since 1964. The New York Blood Center is also home to the Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute and the National Cord Blood Program, the nation's first and largest public cord blood bank. New York Blood Center operates a Clinical Services division as well as a Hemophilia Services division in collaboration with the Hemophilia Consortium -- providing critical drugs and blood products delivered to the homes of area hemophilia patients. New York Blood Center is not affiliated with the American Red Cross.
Contact: Gladwyn Lopez of Rubenstein Communications, Inc., 212-843-9231
http://www.usnewswire.com/
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